On Monday, October 24th, the FHS volleyball team made the long drive down to Kennet, Mo to compete in the Class 3 District 1 tournament. The Seed meeting took place earlier that month setting Fredericktown as the number two seed with the bracket establishing the Ladycats to play their first game against Dexter in the semifinals. Much preparation went into this game. All season the girls discussed and planned to play in the district championship game, and they were not going to let each other down on Monday night.

The night’s first set started out slow as Dexter and Fredericktown played point for point. Eventually, Dexter took the lead and left the Cats trailing behind. Nevertheless, the girls sided out, leaving dexter in the dust, and pushed through, all the way to take the first set 25-19. The Ladycats took this energy into the next set and obtained multiple kills and aces, making for a quick 25-16 closing score for set two. Finally, the girls closed the deal in the third by defeating Dexter 25-17. The excitement roared from the court and the benches as the girls had determinately made their way into the championship game. What made this success even greater was the fact that the Fredericktown Volleyball program hasn’t accomplished this in over 20 years.

Following this win was the highly anticipated championship game that occurred only a short 24 hours after the semifinal games. The Fredericktown Ladycats were matched-up against the number one seed Cape Notre Dame Bulldogs. All of the long hours in the gym, the hard losses, and the exciting wins built the girls for this moment. Rylie Rehkop, a senior on the team, stated, “I felt all of the nerves going into this game, but I felt content at the same time because I knew that all of our hard work during the season made us deserving of being here.”

As the game started and the all pep talks came to a close the girls made their way onto the court. In the first set, Notre Dame came out strong putting up a difficult block. The Ladycats preserved and traded points throughout the whole set; nevertheless, the Bulldogs were able to pull through and close the set 25-22. This wasn’t enough to shut the cats down just yet. In the second set, the girls came out with even more fire and made strategic plays that kept Notre Dame on their toes. In the end, the girls took this set 25-23. Now that both Fredericktown and Notre Dame had earned a set the championship title became even more desirable to each of the teams. The third set began and the competition became even more firece. The Ladycats struck fast racking up point after point, and they were able to keep this momentum to earn a 25-20 set win. This set Fredericktown up to be one more set away from becoming champions. Despite this fact, many factors played a crucial role in stripping this fate for the Ladycats. The fourth set was taken to 25-17 with Notre Dame coming out on top. As well as the monumental, tie-breaking fifth set that was played to fifteen points. This quick game gave the athletes little time to recover from each mishap and instantly left them in tears as Notre Dame clinched the title in the end by 15-9.

Granting all of this there was an endless amount of support spewing from the bench. The team was able to come together after their hard loss and still celebrate their second-place achievement in the class 3 district 1 tournament.